The Transfiguration

It is an absolute foundation stone that it is the Resurrection of Christ that is the characteristic Feast and focus of the Christian Faith. As St. Paul clearly writes, if Christ is not risen from the dead, we are above all to be pitied. Nothing makes sense without the Resurrection. But having said that, the most characteristic Feast as touches our incorporation into Christ is his Transfiguration. (see Matthew 17:1-8)

There are many themes present in this Feast: it contains an epiphany of the Trinity, it shows the fulfillment of the Old Testament in Christ, and much more. Yet I am always struck by the fact that everything around our Lord is changed. What has been hidden is revealed about everything. Christ did not reach a higher degree at his Transfiguration, rather, the glory that he always had with the Father from the beginning was manifested to the three chosen apostles. They were granted the grace to see what already was present.

And yet there is a change of the elements around our Lord that is striking. Our Lord's clothes become whiter than any fuller could make them. His clothes began to radiate the Light of Christ. When we speak of a Christian's "ministry" we need to be very careful unless we try to clericalize the laity and laicize the clergy, making all ministries interchangeable. The principle ministry of the Christian is his cooperation with God in his own sanctification. The Christian's primary work is to become a Saint.

Very often we assume that this means being set free from our passions and to reach the point of no longer committing personal sins. And in a sense this is true, but it is only the very beginning aspect of our sanctification. To be free from sin still does not mean that we have perfected the virtues, and perfecting the virtues doesn't mean that we have achieved a complete union with God yet. But we often are mislead to assume the bare minimum is the goal because we don't know any better.

The Transfiguration shows that part of our complete union with God is the transfiguration of all that is around us. Even our Lord's clothes began to shine forth with his light. And here is the principle reason that I post this on my Western blog. We must transfigure everything around us including our cultures, our times, our homes, and everything about us. We cannot shed off what we have been formed of so that it is not transfigured and glorified, for all things must be brought into union with Christ. And this includes the Western Rite and all of its music and heritage.

If Christianity is simply about "getting to heaven," then none of this really matters because we can all get to heaven in any liturgical rite. But if Christianity is about the transfiguration of the universe in the glory of Christ, then we must offer ourselves and all that we are made of. Therefore anything that would eliminate, or limit, any of the life of Christ as it has been expressed historically is not fully Christian. I have long stated that one is required to love (not merely tolerate) all of the various liturgical expressions of the Church because they are the movement of the Body of Christ in the Spirit to the Father. That does not mean that we need to be comfortable in all of the Rites, but we need to love them all objectively. This is an essential element of Christianity's redemption of all the created Cosmos.

The Western Rite(s) transfigured many lives into great Saints. St. Gregory the Great (or the Dialogos as he is known in the East) never used the Eastern Rite in his life. St. Benedict of Nursia was nourished with the Latin Mass of St. Leo using unleavened bread. St. John Cassian understood so well that the Eastern approach did not work for Italians and so he altered the monastic life that he had learned in Egypt and Mt. Sinai for those in Italy in his Conferences. St. Leo the Great used the sacramentary of the Mass which he promulgated using a western form of chant and the Latin language. St. Martin of Tours, St. Ambrose of Milan, St. Irenaeus of Lyons, St. Clement of Rome, and countless more were fully sanctified and are remembered in every Orthodox Church around the world, and none of them ever used the Rites of the East. Their sanctity was and is the same, but their personal culture was Latin, not Greek.

We must firmly reject the ideal of some sort of globalized Byzantium (like a franchised corporation), and embrace the historic understanding of the universal Church which held a unity in diversity. We must be truly "Catholic," (as in the Creed: One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic) or else we will not participate in the Faith of Christ, nor shall we extend his Transfiguration to the entire created cosmos but only to approved outlets.

Let us all have a greater sense of our work in transfiguring the world around us in our sanctification. Let us bring all things to Christ that he may bless and dwell in them. Let us rejoice in all that bears the light of Christ. And let us remember that nothing is to be withheld from him even if it does not conform to another's tastes or culture.